Monthly Archives: October 2016

Why on earth am I thinking of something so drastic? I don’t want to do it, but aren’t we told to make our work the best it can be?

For a long time I have been worrying about the start. I have written before on whether to have a prologue or not, and if so what it should be. I eventually decided to ditch the prologue and as I had received favourable remarks about the start, it remained. Not untouched, it had gone through my editing with slight changes, but essentially it remained the same piece of writing that came from an exercise in class nearly four years ago. This is a long time ago and I think (hope) that my writing has improved since then.

When submitting to agents, publishers etc. You have to send the first chapter/1000 words/3000 words etc plus synopsis. I had thought the first chapter was OK, but had the feeling it wasn’t as good as “that scene later on, when…”

The book is written in the third person from the protagonist’s (Byrhtnoth) point of view, except for occasions when he is not around.

Recently I was lying in bed, worrying about that first chapter and thought “Why not try it in the first person?”. In the next writing class we were talking about opposites and the homework was to write a scene about two characters showing the differences between them. The two ideas clashed and fused. I rewrote the first scene in the book in the first person, but it wasn’t from Byrhtnoth’s POV, it was Wulfstan’s, his friend. The scene is the first time they meet. I had used Wulfstan in the prologues, looking back and saying he was going to write the story of Byrhtnoth – now he was telling it!

It was easy to write and I enjoyed it. I don’t like to brag, but it was good. I could carry on and write the whole of the first chapter in his voice. The second chapter would have to be completely rewritten, difficult but possible. But what happens then?

The plot divides, Byrhtnoth and Wulfstan part, taking different paths. They meet later and separate again. In fact for a lot of the book, Byrhtnoth is on his own. You might say, why not make Byrhtnoth the narrator? It wouldn’t work, I don’t know why, but Byrhtnoth doesn’t look back – he acts. Wulfstan remembers and writes it down.

What do I do?

I could use my new piece (500 words) which take place outside a door and continue with the original chapter in third person – through the door.
Write the whole first chapter (3k+ words – it has been three shorter chapters!) in first person. The main characters are aged 7.
The second chapter is five years later, more action and Byrhtnoth soon leaves. It really needs to be third person. Should I add a first person intro? But then would have to continue throughout the book. Would it interrupt the action?

We were talking about NaNoWriMo at class last week, I said I might use it to re-write the book from scratch in first person. I don’t know if I could do it. It would be a completely different book, perhaps better, perhaps a waste of time.

Perhaps I should just wait for some feedback from my Beta Readers!

I think writing this post is helping me to clarify things, although I would welcome comments.

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Book 2 of the Byrhtnoth Chronicles

Publication of Bright AxeApril 11th, 2019

21days to go.

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